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U.S. 98 to be closed till Thursday afternoon

Smoke rises over U.S. 98 after a drone crashed at Tyndall Air Force Base Wednesday morning.

Dylan Dunaway / Special to The News Herald

By RANDAL YAKEY | The News Herald

Published: Wednesday, July 17, 2013 at 09:41 PM.

TYNDALL AIR FORCE BASE — A 35,000-pound drone crashed at the end of a runway during takeoff Wednesday morning, closing U.S. 98 for more than 24 hours.

The drone is a converted Phantom jet fighter referred to as a QF-4.

“We crashed a QF-4 on the runway at Tyndall,” said Col. James Vogel, commander of the 53rd Weapons Evaluation Group (WEG), who is in charge of the drone program at Tyndall.

To compound the problem, Air Force officials, as of Wednesday evening, said they did not know whether an explosive device or “charge” was used to destroy the drone if it veered off course during its in-flight mission.

“We don’t know of any evidence that the charge was detonated or not,” Vogel said.

Air Force officials also said they would not search for the device until the battery inside ran down, which usually takes about 24 hours.

“We don’t know where it is yet, so we are going to wait until its time has completely expired and we will more forward from there,” Vogel said.

TYNDALL AIR FORCE BASE — A 35,000-pound drone crashed at the end of a runway during takeoff Wednesday morning, closing U.S. 98 for more than 24 hours.

The drone is a converted Phantom jet fighter referred to as a QF-4.

“We crashed a QF-4 on the runway at Tyndall,” said Col. James Vogel, commander of the 53rd Weapons Evaluation Group (WEG), who is in charge of the drone program at Tyndall.

To compound the problem, Air Force officials, as of Wednesday evening, said they did not know whether an explosive device or “charge” was used to destroy the drone if it veered off course during its in-flight mission.

“We don’t know of any evidence that the charge was detonated or not,” Vogel said.

Air Force officials also said they would not search for the device until the battery inside ran down, which usually takes about 24 hours.

“We don’t know where it is yet, so we are going to wait until its time has completely expired and we will more forward from there,” Vogel said.

Mission Support Cmdr. William Grund said fire and smoke surrounding the drone was hampering the effort to learn the status of the device. Grund said the Air Force cordoned off a 4,000-foot radius around the area until the fire goes out sometime Thursday.

The incident prompted Air Force officials to close U.S. 98 on Wednesday morning, forcing a lengthy delay for traffic traveling between Parker and Mexico Beach. The highway is expected to remain closed until Thursday afternoon, officials said late Wednesday.

Cars were lined up on U.S. 98, which runs through Tyndall, for miles as Air Force security blocked off traffic.

The crash happened as a second drone was already in the air. Tyndall officials said they blew up the second drone with a missile over the Gulf, as planned.

Recent incident

Wednesday’s crash was the second incident within a week involving a drone. On July 11, a drone out of Tyndall had to be destroyed, causing it to plunge into the Gulf of Mexico near St. Joseph Peninsula State Park, the Gulf County Sheriff’s Office said.

GCSO Lt. Paul Beasley said a 911 dispatcher received a call about 10:30 a.m. EDT that a flaming object had plunged into the water just offshore.

“They saw a big flash of fire that landed in the Gulf,” Beasley said at the time of the incident.

At the time of the July 11 crash, Herman Bell, chief of Tyndall’s 325th Fighter Wing public affairs, said the drone had gone “haywire” and the controllers were forced to destroy the craft.

But, Vogel said Wednesday, the July 11 drone destruction was done because of incidents that interrupted bringing the drone back to base.

“The second approach there we came in and there was a jet skier off the runway who had breached our control boats’ (space) and put the public in danger, so we turned the drone around again,” Vogel said.

Drones can be controlled in most of the restricted areas in the Gulf of Mexico, Vogel said.

Boats are a major impediment to get clear air space to shoot weapons in the Gulf, he noted.

Grund said the highway is routinely closed on a temporary basis when drones are launched and return to the air base.

Witnesses at the scene of Wednesday’s crash reported black smoke rising from the base just before 9 a.m.

“They (Air Force security) stopped us on Highway 98 by the fire station when they launched the drones,” said Dylan Dunaway, who commutes from Port St. Joe to Panama City to attend Gulf Coast State College. “We were stopped when we saw a plume of black smoke getting bigger and bigger coming from the airfield. The fire trucks started moving and we knew something was wrong.”

Motorists traveling between Parker and Mexico Beach should use State 22 and State 71 as a detour.

The drones assigned to the 53rd WEG run about 100 unmanned drone sorties, or missions, each year, Vogel said.

The QF-4 is referred to as a “reusable drone,” according to the U.S. Air Force’s official website. The drone is 63 feet long, rising to 16 feet high and weighs 30,328 pounds. With jet fuel added, the weight of the plane rises to about 35,000 pounds, Vogel said.

The investigation into Wednesday’s incident is expected to continue Thursday.